Clipmarks | AcesLucky's 'culture' clips

Paying off a debt with a daughter

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 20:57:36 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: Family values.

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

The ban on poppy farming in Afghanistan may hamper the heroin trade but it also leaves farmers in poverty.

Kate Clark meets one who has had to negotiate the betrothal of his six-year-old daughter to pay a debt.

In a country without banks, opium is the standard way to get a loan.

The ban means he is having to grow low-value wheat.

And because he is landless, his only asset is his female children.

He has already exchanged two daughters for debt and now the youngest has wiped off a further £1,000 ($2,000) worth, a huge amount of money in rural Afghanistan.

Did he not feel any shame, I asked, about marrying off his six-year-old?

No, he said, the real shame would have been to have his creditors knocking at his door, embarrassing him in front of the village.

Your daughter, I persisted, how does she feel?

"Oh, she's happy to be solving her father's problems," he said.

Tags: afghanistan, heroin, slavery, child abuse, culture, family values

Saudi women -- gaining success, breaking barriers

Wed, 28 May 2008 11:09:54 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: "In addition to Al-Dossary, these women include Nahed Taher, who went to Bahrain to set up her own investment bank in 2005 and has since become a major investor in infrastructure and energy projects in the region; Nabilah Tunisi, a leading executive at Saudi oil giant Aramco, who oversees 380 engineers as a manager on project support and controls; and Samra Al-Kuwaiz, the managing director of the women's division of Osool Brokerage Company, which is tapping into the growing wealth of the country's women."

"Saudi Arabia is decidedly not an easy place for women to succeed: Women are not permitted to drive or vote..."

Clip Source: www.portfolio.com

Al-Dossary has become a pro at pushing against the boundaries of acceptable behavior for Saudi women. Not yet 40, she runs Saudi Arabia's largest scrap-metal business, $500 million-plus Al-Sale Trading and Contracting Company, and even though she didn't win the chamber of commerce seat after a campaign for it that earned her the attention of the bearded bloggers, she's leading a pack of women who are controlling more of the nation's wealth, and increasingly moving into positions of power.

Today, women constitute about 55 percent of the kingdom's college graduates. They own 10 percent of the country's real estate, one-third of the brokerage accounts, and about 40 percent of the country's family-run companies (albeit mostly as silent partners), according to a recent report from the Economist Intelligence Unit. The E.I.U. further estimates that Saudi women have about $12 billion in cash, with three-quarters of it sitting in banks, much of it from inheritances.

Tags: saudi women, success, business, society, economy, culture

New Testament - on Women's rights

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 01:53:18 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: So many translations; so many interpretations; but sometimes they all say essentially the same thing... women are second class citizens... thus saith the Lord.

Is the word of god "subject to" the culture of the times? Or do we change the interpretation of god's word to fit our sensibilities at the time?

Perhaps we create god's word as we go. Certainly our interpretation does.

Clip Source: bible.cc

<< 1 Corinthians 14:34 >>

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)
the women must keep silent. They don't have the right to speak. They must take their place as Moses' Teachings say.

King James Bible
Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law.

(15) Women are commanded to be silent in public assemblies, and they are commanded to ask of their husbands at home.

1 Corinthians 11:5 But every woman who has her head uncovered while praying or prophesying disgraces her head, for she is one and the same as the woman whose head is shaved.

Young's Literal Translation
Your women in the assemblies let them be silent, for it hath not been permitted to them to speak, but to be subject, as also the law saith;

Bible in Basic English
Let women keep quiet in the churches: for it is not right for them to be talking; but let them be under control, as it says in the law.

Tags: bible, christian, christianity, dominionism, faith, freedom, morality, religion

Paper, Rock, Scissors

Sat, 17 Nov 2007 21:36:59 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky

Clip Source: www.foundmagazine.com

Tags: society, culture, whatever

Sorry -- I couldn't help it. ( Half-time for Democracy )

Thu, 25 Oct 2007 01:14:06 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: Half time for Democracy. The truth hurts. Funny funny.

Clip Source: video.stumbleupon.com

[Video]

Half-Time For Democracy

Tags: american, culture, society, democracy

Atheist doctors more likely to care for the poor

Mon, 15 Oct 2007 00:17:21 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: This is consistent with secular morals and ethics.

Clip Source: pressesc.com

Atheist doctors more likely to care for the poor than religious ones

Atheist doctors are likely to practice medicine among the underprivileged than religious physicians, even though most religions call on the faithful to serve the poor, according to the results of large cross-sectional survey of US medical practitioners published in Annals of Family Medicine.

"This came as both a surprise and a disappointment," study author Farr Curlin, MD, said. "The Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and Buddhist scriptures all urge physicians to care for the poor, and the great majority of religious physicians describe their practice of medicine as a calling. Yet we found that religious physicians were not more likely to report practice among the underserved than their secular colleagues."

Curlin and colleagues surveyed 1,820 practicing physicians from all specialties of whom 1,144 (63%) responded.

Tags: atheism, bible, christianity, church, culture, faith, god, religion, medicine

An Atheist with a sense of humor -- Funny!

Wed, 10 Oct 2007 16:55:46 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: All these are funny, short films. I don't know why it's filed under atheist at youtube,

Clip Source: www.youtube.com

[Video]

An Atheist With a Sense of Humor

Tags: atheism, funny, humor, marijuana, culture

Our Tax dollars at waste - medical marijuana and the fed

Wed, 26 Sep 2007 22:41:23 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: The wasted war on medical marijuana.

Clip Source: www.alternet.org

The Federal War on Medical Marijuana Becomes a War on Children

Automatic weapons. Check. Helicopters. Check. Dogs. Check. Bulletproof vests. Check.

Raids on medical marijuana dispensaries throughout California on July 17 by federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents, often with local law enforcement officers in tow, seemed designed to send a clear signal that the feds were deliberately escalating their war on medical marijuana patients.

A church-going family man who used medical marijuana to ease chronic pain from injuries sustained in a 2001 car accident, Naulls already had two successful businesses -- one as an IT consultant and another as a real estate property manager -- when he established the Healing Nations Collective to save fellow Corona patients the hours-long drive to Los Angeles for medicine.

Naulls' home and businesses were invaded by DEA agents armed with shotguns, automatic rifles -- even helicopters.

They weren't even accused of breaking any state laws.

Tags: marijuana, medical, taxes, drugs, culture, moral values, politics

Anti-Evolution group paid by tax payers and politics

Wed, 26 Sep 2007 22:29:10 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: Money is easier to forgive.

Clip Source: rawstory.com

Vitter secures $100K for Louisiana anti-evolution group

Religous conservatives receiving funds have political ties to embattled senator

In a move ostensibly aimed at providing "better science education" in Louisiana schools, Sen. David Vitter has secured $100,000 in taxpayer dollars to fund an anti-evolution effort spearheaded by a religious group politically connected to the alleged prostitute-soliciting Republican.

Despite Vitter's admission earlier this year that he used a Washington, DC, call-girl service and allegations that he frequented prostitutes in New Orleans, the first-term Republican has maintained the support of religious conservatives in his home state.

"Dan Richey, the group's grass-roots coordinator, was paid $17,250 as a consultant in Vitter's 2004 Senate race," according to the newspaper. "Records also show that Vitter's campaign employed Beryl Amedée, the education resource council chairwoman for the Louisiana Family Forum."

Tags: bush administration, christianity, culture, faith, god, moral values, religion, evolution, creationism, intelligent design

Where does Bush get his staff?

Tue, 18 Sep 2007 10:20:03 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: Bill Maher on Where Bush gets his staff. Absolutely True!

Clip Source: www.brasschecktv.com

Where does Bush gets his staff?

[Video]

Tags: politics, bush, bush administration, law, pat robertson, christianity, religion, culture

Spiritual Fraud -- Superstition and the Gullible -- a confession

Sun, 16 Sep 2007 22:48:43 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: "No amount of evidence to the contrary, including confession by the fraud who performed the tricks, is good enough to sway the True Believer."

Clip Source: www.holysmoke.org

No matter how often the confidence scammers are exposed, those who believe will happily continue to pay cold hard cash to be deceived.

"The true-believer syndrome merits study by science. What is it that compels a person, past all reason, to believe the unbelievable? How can an otherwise sane individual become so enamored of a fantasy, an imposture, that even after it's exposed in the bright light of day he still clings to it--- indeed, clings to it all the harder?

"The true-believer syndrome is the greatest thing phony mediums have going for them. No amount of logic can shatter a faith consciously based on a lie."

No amount of evidence to the contrary, including confession by the fraud who performed the tricks, is good enough to sway the True Believer. If you are among these poor souls, well, you have my sympathy, but you must admit you "had it comming to you." After all, you believe the impossible--- shouldn't you pay for such stupidity?

Tags: culture, religion, superstition, theology, god, fraud

Cobra and Child -- WTF?

Thu, 13 Sep 2007 02:32:11 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: I so wanted to think this was a trick of some sort. Is the world gone mad? This was labeled as "fun" and "funny". I don't see it.

Clip Source: video.stumbleupon.com

[Video]

Tags: cobra, child, culture

Solomon’s House - The Deeper Agenda of the New Creation Museum in Kentucky

Wed, 23 May 2007 09:53:46 GMT

clipped by: sl0wdjin

Clip Source: www.skeptic.com

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a 3-D museum exhibit is worth a thousand pictures. In this week’s eSkeptic we publish a review of the new young-earth creationism museum in Kentucky, visited by our colleague and correspondent Stephen Asma, a professor of philosophy at Columbia College Chicago who is well equipped to evaluate the museum on its own terms, as he has published a book on natural history museums with Oxford University Press (2001) entitled Stuffed Animals and Pickled Heads: The Culture and Evolution of Natural History Museums. Come join Stephen on a journey into the distant past (4000 years ago) when dinosaurs ruled the decks on Noah’s Ark and the universe was created around the same time that the Egyptians invented red wine.

Tags: science, religion, creationism

The Gay Animal Kingdom

Wed, 28 Feb 2007 22:34:59 GMT

clipped by: AcesLucky
clipper's remarks: Didn't god make these animals too? So much for the "abomination" theory. But then, which is true, real life facts, or a bible written by 1st century goat herders?

Clip Source: www.nhne.org

The Gay Animal Kingdom

Joan Roughgarden thinks Charles Darwin made a terrible mistake. Not about natural selection -- she's no bible-toting creationist -- but about his other great theory of evolution: sexual selection. According to Roughgarden, sexual selection can't explain the homosexuality that's been documented in over 450 different vertebrate species. This means that same-sex sexuality -- long disparaged as a quirk of human culture -- is a normal, and probably necessary, fact of life. By neglecting all those gay animals, she says, Darwin misunderstood the basic nature of heterosexuality.

Male big horn sheep live in what are often called "homosexual societies."

If a male sheep chooses to not have gay sex, it becomes a social outcast. Ironically, scientists call such straight-laced males "effeminate."

Giraffes have all-male orgies. So do bottlenose dolphins, killer whales, gray whales, and West Indian manatees. Japanese macaques, on the other hand, are ardent lesbians

Tags: theology, religion, god, christianity, bible, atheism